This invention relates to exercise handweights and more particularly to an exercise handweight used to strengthen the muscles and endurance for playing guitars and other string musical instruments.
The playing of a guitar and other musical instruments requires considerable strength and endurance in the lower arm, wrist and hands. The muscles of the lower arm, wrist and, more particularly, the hand, must be sufficiently strong to endure long hours of playing. Heretofore the only way to increase the strength and endurance of these muscles was through many hours of playing a guitar. Thus, the need exists for an apparatus like the present invention that will enable a musician to increase the strength and endurance of specific muscles more rapidly than through normal usage.
Exercise handweights and gloves have been developed for sports and other uses but none like the present invention. For instance, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,556,215 and 5,575,075 by Tarbox, et al. teach hand exercise weights which wrap around the hand and have weight in both the palm side and backhand side of the gloves. The location of the weights and design of the exercise handweights in Tarbox, however, make it impossible to utilize while playing a guitar or other musical instrument. U.S. Pat. No. 4,684,123 by Fabray shows a complete glove with a weight attached thereto. Unfortunately, the Fabray glove covers the fingers and thus would not be usable for playing a guitar. U.S. Pat. No. 4,546,495 by Castillo shows a weighted glove, but this glove too is designed with a weight to be placed in both the palm and the backhand sides, and thus would interfere with guitar playing. Another U.S. Pat. No. 4,034,979 by Wester shows a weighted bowling glove which has a weight on the backhand-side which is worn to counterbalance the pull of the bowling ball held in the other hand. This, too, is a much different design than the present invention. U.S. Pat. No. 3,369,258 by Smith shows a wraparound golf glove with thumbhole which uses Velcro fasteners. Smith's device has weight or padding contained in the palm to absorb the shock of the club. Such a weight in the palm would interfere with the flexing of the fingers and hand, thus not be usable while guitar playing.
All the above mentioned patents were developed for sports and not for increasing the strength and endurance of muscles for playing musical instruments. The only patent found dealing with strengthening the muscles for playing musical instruments is U.S. Pat. No. 535,220 by Osterhout which shows a device to increase finger strength by inserting the finger into a slot and flexing same. Unfortunately, this device could not be used while playing the instrument and did nothing to increase the strength of hand and wrist muscles.
The present invention is specially designed to increase the strength and endurance of hand and wrist muscles which are important to playing guitar or other musical instruments. By allowing the musician to wear these .while playing the instrument, the musician can be more proficient at his or her instrument while increasing the strength of the pertinent muscles at the same time. Although the present invention is described in more detail later, briefly, when opened the device is somewhat elongated in shape and contains a weight sewn inside a heavy cloth material at one end, a hole centrally located along the length and width of the device for inserting the thumb and a strap at the other end so that the device can be wrapped securely and comfortably around the playing hand. In this manner the fingers and thumb are free and the weight is on the back of the hand, not the palm, so that the device does not interfere with the hand or fingers while playing.